


red fish, blue fish

by pvwork



Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Alternate Universe - College/University, Ambiguous Relationships, Ambiguous/Open Ending, Gen, Getting to Know Each Other, M/M, mention of a grandparent passing away
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-08-21
Updated: 2016-08-21
Packaged: 2018-08-10 02:29:26
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,476
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7826704
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/pvwork/pseuds/pvwork
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>
  <i>“Let’s get out of the house today,” Lance croaks. The last time he strung together a sentence that made sense was probably before Keith pushed him against the bathroom door during the house party last night. </i>
</p><p>  <i>“Us.”</i></p><p>  <i>“Yeah,” Lance says. “Look, we’re already making breakfast together. Let’s, uh, keep the ball rolling. It’ll be fun.” </i></p><p>--</p><p>Lance and Keith go to the aquarium.</p>
            </blockquote>





	red fish, blue fish

**Author's Note:**

  * For [](https://archiveofourown.org/gifts).



> Title from Dr. Seuss's book _One Fish Two Fish Red Fish Blue Fish_.  >:)
> 
> For S, thanks for the prompt.

Keith reluctantly helps Lance make breakfast in the morning.

Reluctantly is the key word because Lance doubts he’s ever seen another person so unwilling to place a few white eggs into a boiling pot of water. It was like watching a picky bear eat frozen fish or a freshman step onto campus for the first day of school—- performing a repugnant act only because it was absolutely necessary. 

Present-Lance stands next to the microwave waiting for two servings of instant oatmeal to heat up while he stares at the row of hickeys Past-Lance sucked in a neat row down the line of Keith’s spine. He remembers handing in math assignments messier than his handy work there.

“Let’s get out of the house today,” Lance croaks. The last time he strung together a sentence that made sense was probably before Keith pushed him against the bathroom door during the house party last night. 

“Us.”

“Yeah,” Lance says. “Look, we’re already making breakfast together. Let’s, uh, keep the ball rolling. It’ll be fun.” 

“Fun.” 

“It’ll get us out of having to clean up from last night.” The house party had been in their house. “Allura can’t make us clean if we’re not here.”

“Okay,” Keith grunts. 

This is domestic as fuck, Lance thinks. 

*

“Are you...are you crying now?” Keith asks. He sounds panicked and bewildered as he presses himself against the passenger side door like he’s trying to escape whatever airborne spore that might have imbued Lance with feelings.

Lance sniffs. Manfully. He sniffs manfully. “No I’m not! I mean I am a little! I’m teary eyed, but I’m not crying.”

“We’re listening to a national public broadcast about urban crime.” 

“And it’s legitly sad! I’m a sensitive boy!” 

“God, you’re such a cry baby,” Keith scoffs. 

“Whatever! At least I’m capable of feeling things.” 

Lance isn’t even mad that he was caught almost-cry while listening to an upsetting broadcast. He’s more mad about how Keith doesn’t get why he’s crying and how he doesn’t have the words to explain himself either. Inside his chest is just a massive riot of feelings more jumbled than a basket of yarn. 

Lance is sad about the shit score he got on his latest history paper. He’s mad that Hunk is mad at him for never wanting to go grab midnight snacks from King Taco’s because he’s too busy necking with Keith, and he’s especially smad that gun violence is so prevalent and unavoidable and the best people always seem to get hurt first.

“How do you do funerals?” Even Keith’s sneer is understated. He lifts the left corner of his lip and one of his eyebrows and places a heavy mantle of judgement on your shoulders. Congratulations, his sneer conveys, you suck.

“I cried like a bitch at my abuelita’s funeral!” Lance bursts out even as he eases the car to a gentle stop. “That’s how I do funerals!” 

Out of the corner of his eye, Lance watches Keith freeze up. Lance makes the turn in silence.

*

There aren’t any great whites at the aquarium, because according to a placard inside the Tunnel to the Sea, they are too big to successfully raise in captivity. Fortunately, there were a few reef and nurse sharks cutting their way through the water, swinging their heads back and forth. 

“Keith! Keith! What did the otolarry-oto— eyes-nose-ears doctor say to the shark who got water up its nose?

“Do you mean an otolaryngologists.”

Lance rolls his eyes and slips his arm around Keith in a strangle hold. He makes exaggerated kissy noises into Keith’s ear to up the annoying factor. “Follow the script, _babe_. I’m asking the jokes here, you just have to say ‘what’.” 

“Then why do I have to be here.”

“Live a little! Just do it, Keith.”

“I don’t know, _babe_ , what did the otolaryngologist say to the shark who got water up its nose?”

“You, mister, are a fucking spoil sport and should be banned from all organized forms of fun. You ruined it. The punchline was nose duh,” Lance says, “and that’s hilarious”

At this point, their faces are as close they’ve ever been without one of them trying to initiate a little something more, and Lance realizes that he’s never had an uninterrupted chance to just look into Keith’s eyes. He’s leveling Lance with an unimpressed look right now, but he has beautiful eyes. Lance doesn’t know what to do with this new information. It’s baffling. 

“Look, look, I get it, the execution was weak but that was because you weren’t being a willing joke recipient.” Lance pulls away and grins.

Keith narrows his beautiful eyes, and Lance wants to climb into the thousands gallon tank to swim with the sharks as Keith grabs his hand and starts to tug him in the direction of the next exhibit. They’ve never held hands before, Lance’s brain screams. 

Keith says, “I think you just suck at telling jokes.” He doesn’t sound very disappointed in Lance’s lack of joke telling ability, so Lance takes it as a win. 

*

“What are you even afraid of?”

“They’re so slimy!” Lance whispered. He slowly submerged his hand into the shallow pool of water and gingerly touched a manta ray. 

Keith gave him another look, like Lance was being ridiculous whispering in front of a petting zoo full of mussels and manta rays. Who knew what they were capable of! Sound traveled faster through water. 

“They’re not going to bite you. Their mouths face down so they can feed on fish hiding in the sea bed.” 

“Or so that you can’t see the attack coming!” 

“That doesn’t even make sense!”

These were the kinds of moments that Lance lived for, when he riled Keith up enough that he got a reaction. Keith wasn’t actually as cool as he always tried to make himself seem, and Lance knew that, but it was so frustrating when Keith pretended that he didn’t feel just as much as Lance did about stuff. 

Keith could be impatient and rude and he wasn’t a morning person and Lance knew he wasn’t perfect but goddamn did he like Keith so much that it hurt. Too bad Keith only saw him as an easy lay. 

Keith was running his fingers gently across the fins of a manta ray, transfixed. The bright, open look of wonder on his face made Lance’s heart squeeze and he had to look away. It would be kind of cool if Keith ever looked at him that way, like he was special or important, but it was stupid to be jealous of a fish. 

“If you like me, blink once for no, twice for yes,” Lance muttered to the ray he’s trying to pet, but the thing just oozed away in little undulating waves. 

*

Pidge is sprawled out on the tiny patch of grass of they call a front lawn flipping through a textbook listlessly when they pull up to the house. 

Lance takes a deep breath. He kills the engine. “Hey, thanks for hanging out with me all day,” he gets out in a rush. His voice feels like its two seconds away from cracking, something that hasn’t happened since the ninth grade. “I hope you had fun.”

“I hang out with you all the time,” Keith says. His eyebrows perform an elaborate interpretive dance that Lance doesn’t understand. He’s not fluent in Keith yet, but given the chance he thinks he could be.

“Yeah, well, we’re not talking during all those times. I don’t learn anything about you or anything, except for how you don’t have a gag reflex.” As soon as the words leave his mouth, Lance wants to swallow them back down. They were a mistake. Now Lance is going to have to spend the rest of fall and winter shivering alone in his twin instead of squishing with Keith who may be a horrible blanket hog but is still a decent space heater on colder nights. 

“Lance,” Keith says after a long pause. “I had fun today.” 

It’s the first time that Lance can remember hearing Keith say his name like that. 

It shouldn’t be such a big deal but it is. It feels good when he can make Keith hiss or moan or gasp his name, curse and spit and shout his name, but it feels really good in a surprisingly simple way just to hear Keith say _Lance_ like he wants Lance to know that spending the day with him wasn’t a total waste of time. 

Lance is too afraid to turn to look at Keith in the passenger seat. Instead, he says his next words to the windshield and scowls at Pidge when she looks up from her book with a smile like she can guess what they’re talking about. “Do you want to, I dunno, do this again sometime?”


End file.
